The present invention relates generally to a file management apparatus and method, and a recording medium embodying the apparatus and method, and more particularly to a file management apparatus and method for managing the files of data to be recorded on or reproduced from a disk.
One prior art file system for recording data on a disk recording medium is described as ISO/IEC13346 (1995), xe2x80x9cInformation Technologyxe2x80x94Volume and File Structure of Write-Once and Rewritable Media using Non-sequential Recording for Information Interchangexe2x80x9d. This is an industrial-strength file system, and includes a multi-purpose file system for recording various types of data. This is not an efficient system for home use to record compressed digital AV (audio and video) signals on a disk.
During home use, after one or more AV signals have been recorded to a disk, they may need to be edited by being divided or combined together. It may also be necessary that the same. AV signals be referred to by a plurality of program sequences. For example, one or more edited sequences may require playback of a same portion of a recorded AV signal. In a conventional file system, editing including the division or combination of recorded AV signals is complicated, and often requires that data must be copied and redundantly stored multiple times on the recording medium, once for each time the AV signal is to be used by a program sequence file, so that a plurality of files may refer to the same recorded data.
The present invention has been made in view of the above-described circumstances, and is intended to facilitate editing of recorded AV signals and to enable a plurality of files to refer to the same recorded data without the need of redundantly copying and storing the data.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide an improved apparatus and method for recording AV signals that are to be later subjected to various editing procedures.
Another object of the invention is to provide an improved apparatus and method for editing recorded AV signals so that one or more files may refer to these recorded AV signals without requiring that these AV signals be redundantly recorded more than once on a recording medium.
Still other objects and advantages of the invention will in part be obvious and will in part be apparent from the specification and the drawings.
Generally speaking, in accordance with the invention, a file management apparatus and method is provided for managing the files of audio and/or video data to be recorded on or reproduced from a recording medium. The file management apparatus and method includes a first management apparatus for managing a master file recorded on a recording medium, a second management apparatus for designating at least part of the master file as at least one shared element, and a third management apparatus for managing one or more of the shared elements as part of one or more shared files so that a plurality of shared files can refer to the same shared element without the shared element being redundantly copied on the recording medium.
The invention accordingly comprises the several steps and the relation of one or more of such steps with respect to each of the others, and the apparatus embodying features of construction, combinations of elements and arrangement of parts that are adapted to effect such steps, all as exemplified in the following detailed disclosure, and the scope of the invention will be indicated in the claims.